Mid-Western Regional Director Receives Prestigious Legal Award
U.S. District Court Judge Miles-LaGrange helps African countries improve legal systems
U.S. District Court Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange and AKA's Mid-Western Regional Director was presented the prestigious Fern Holland Courageous Lawyer Award from the Oklahoma Bar Association during its 102nd Annual Meeting recently held in Tulsa, Oklahoma. According to OBA officials, this coveted award is presented to an OBA member "who has courageously performed in a manner befitting the highest ideals of the legal profession."
Miles-LaGrange serves in Oklahoma City as judge for the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma.
In saluting Judge Miles-LaGrange, OBA hailed her for taking her talents and idealism, her diplomacy and her legal expertise to Rwanda, Liberia and Ghana to work in dedicated efforts to improve the legal systems of those countries—sometimes at great personal risk.
Specifically, Judge Miles-LaGrange spent two and one-half years working in Rwanda trying to restore peace and justice under the rule of law after the genocide of almost one million people in 1994. Her team's goal was to establish an adequately funded court system with control over its own budget and administered by competent and impartial judges subject to a code of judicial ethics and conduct.
She continues to work closely with Rwanda President Paul Kgame and others to reform and strengthen the country's judicial system. Her work, along with the work of others, has led to establishing a list of new laws needed to propel Rwanda forward, identifying existing outdated laws and drafting new laws for consideration by the Cabinet and National Assembly.
As a member of the United States review team, Judge Miles-LaGrange worked to prepare a detailed assessment for judicial education and training as well as suggestions and recommendations as to how the cadre of newly appointed judges might best be prepared to assume their new roles in Rwanda's reformed judicial system.
Judge Miles-LaGrange's legal career has been shaped by her upbringing in Oklahoma, her education at Vassar College, her legal training at Howard University, her experience in private practice, her work as a state and chief federal prosecutor, her service as an Oklahoma state senator and her daily work as a judge. In 1999, she was appointed by the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist to the International Judicial Relations Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States.
The 15,000-member Oklahoma Bar Association, headquartered in Oklahoma City, was created by the Oklahoma Supreme Court to advance the administration of justice and to foster and maintain learning, integrity, competence, public service and high standards of conduct among Oklahoma's legal community.